You have to admire Hillary Clinton for her ability to reshape reality to her preferred outcome. She seems to assume that if she says something loudly enough, and repeats it often enough, it will become true. Her victory speech in Puerto Rico was a minor masterpiece in carefully parsed self-delusion. Unfortunately for her, it takes more than conviction to win the Democratic nominating contest.

THE FACTS

Whatever Clinton might say, there is considerable doubt about her claim to be "winning the popular vote." The only sense in which that is true is if she includes all the people who voted for her not only in Florida but also in Michigan, an election that she previously said "is not going to count for anything." She also has to exclude the 230,000 "uncommitted" voters in Michigan, most of whom would have probably supported Barack Obama had he been on the ballot, and caucus participants in four states -- Iowa, Nevada, Maine and Washington.

The best running tally that I have seen on various definitions of the popular vote comes from Real Clear Politics. It shows that if all the votes are included, and the uncommitted Michigan vote is awarded to Obama, the Land of Lincolner ends up with a slight lead in the overall "popular vote." He also has a small lead in the popular vote including Florida but excluding Michigan and the caucus states.

The more important point, of course, is that the popular vote has nothing to do with the Democratic presidential nominating process, which is decided by delegates. After the Puerto Rico primary, and the rules changes adopted over the weekend, most estimates now put Obama within 45 votes of the 2,118 needed to secure the nomination. Clinton, meanwhile, is 200 votes away from the magic figure. That is hardly "a slight lead" in the delegate count.

Contrary to Clinton's wishful thinking, it seems highly probable that Obama will nail down the number of delegates needed to win the nomination after today's primaries in Montana and South Dakota, where there are a total of 31 pledged delegates. In order to win the nomination, Obama needs roughly 20 percent of the remaining pledged and unpledged delegates, while Clinton needs around 80 percent.

Clinton's campaign also likes to claim that more Americans have voted for her "than anyone in primary history." That is an artful formula, because it neatly sidesteps the controversy over the disputed elections in Florida and Michigan. It may or may not be true, depending on how you define your terminology.

THE PINOCCHIO TEST

This is one of those cases where the candidate can provide some data to back up his or her claim, but the claim itself is essentially meaningless. To paraphrase Hillary Clinton, "the people have spoken" and they have chosen their candidate. That candidate is . . . Barack Obama.

ONE PINOCCHIO: Some shading of the facts. TWO PINOCCHIOS: Significant omissions or exaggerations. THREE PINOCCHIOS: Significant factual errors. FOUR PINOCCHIOS: Real whoppers. THE GEPPETTO CHECK MARK: Statements and claims contain the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

The source was the Washington Post. All you did was post a bunch of blogs but you did not post any independent facts to combat what was said.

There are horror story from both sides of the aisles, both sides of the match.

Bill Clinton was elected and participated in Primaries/Caucuses. There was not any complaints from the Clintons then. So why now? Because they did not get what they want. I understand being upset when you lose but her speech tonight was filled with too much "I" "I" "I", "Me", "Me", "Me". She is a bit self-centered and it is not a good look